


You Can’t Hurry Love

by strawberrylovely



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, First Meetings, Fluff, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Pre-Poly, meet cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-31
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-10-01 15:53:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17247065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strawberrylovely/pseuds/strawberrylovely
Summary: Lance has been searching for love in all the wrong places. But with the help of Phil Collins, he may have just found it.





	You Can’t Hurry Love

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pythagoreanpineapple](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pythagoreanpineapple/gifts).



> This is for my dear friend PythagoreanPineapple! She asked, so very long ago, for meet-cute Shallurance with [You Can’t Hurry Love](https://youtu.be/upnrXooMh4s) playing in the background, which, honestly, is the cutest thing ever.
> 
> Py, bby, I’m so sorry this has taken so long. Thank you for being patient with me, I don’t deserve you. This prompt was so good, I loved writing it so much, and I hope I did you justice. <3

_I need love, love. Oh, ease my mind. And I need to find time, someone to call mine-_

Lance groaned into his milkshake. He used to love this song, how upbeat and hopeful it was. It was one his mother would always play when he was feeling low in the romance department. But right now, as it played over his booth in the small diner, it couldn’t have been more inappropriate. He’d just been talking to someone a few days ago, thinking maybe they were interested in him. But when he texted their number asking if they could meet up, all he received was radio silence. He’d been played, once again, and he was beginning to lose hope he’d ever find love. 

_You can’t hurry love. No, you just have to wait…_

He took a sip of his milkshake and let his mind wander as the song droned on above him. His eyes fell to the waitress nearby, a beautiful young girl with long, flowing white hair and a gorgeous smile to match. Lance had never seen her here before, and he guessed she must have been a new hire from how jittery she seemed as she took a few patrons’ orders.

He watched her for a while, flittering by with a happy grin plastered on her face, hiding very obvious discomfort of her first day on the job. It was charming, in a way, how she seemed to want to be perfect, but also trying a little too hard not to slip up. Her pretty hands wrote down orders and delivered plates to and from the kitchen, and she thought no one saw her wiggle cheerfully to herself when she got a table’s food delivered with no problems, but Lance did, and he was completely smitten.

“Cute,” he grinned around his straw.

_How many heartaches must I stand before I find the love to let me live again?_

_Exactly_ , Lance thought as the interrupting song expressed his exact internal sentiments.

While his attention was momentarily pulled to the song overhead, rolling his eyes to himself and taking another sip on his straw, he completely missed the waitress walking over to him until she was speaking.

“Are you still doing alright, sir?” the white haired girl, whose name tag Lance could now see said _Allura_ , asked in a surprising English accent.

“Yeah, I’m okay.” Lance responded, completely ignoring the sour mood the song from the speakers was putting him in to smile up at her.

“Let me know if you need anything,” she said, her painted lips returning his smile.

In the back of his mind, a voice told him to flirt with her, to at least _try_ rather than giving himself a pity party. But when he went to use some terrible line he’d probably used a million times before, he couldn’t get the words out.

 _She’s way too out of my league, anyway_ , he thought to himself, emphasizing his smile at her with a nod.

“I will, thanks.”

He watched as she walked away, sighing to himself as he was left alone with Phil Collins reminding him of his sorrows.

_No, I can’t bear to live my life alone. I grow impatient for a love to call my own…_

“How long is this song?” Lance mumbled annoyedly under his breath.

He didn’t have time to focus on that thought much longer, for his attention was pulled to the jingle at the front of the joint as someone walked through the door.

His lips fell from the straw as the stranger came into view, an _entire_ man wearing a leather jacket and matching fingerless gloves standing at the entrance, smiling over at the waiter welcoming him in. Lance was suddenly very happy to call himself bisexual, as this was easily the next object of his long-distance affection, right alongside that cute waitress with the accent and pretty name.

_Love don’t come easy. Well, it’s a game of give and take…_

This man’s smile was infectious; Lance had completely forgotten about the song playing (well, mostly) as he watched the waiter at the entrance convey to the handsome stranger that there was open seating and to just find himself a spot wherever he pleased.

A few elderly patrons walked passed him out the door, to which he patted the man on the back like they were old friends, which would surprise Lance, seeing as he’d never had the pleasure of laying his eyes upon this angelic being before. As the man smiled, the scar across his face stretched and moved in a way that made Lance imagine how he got it. Probably from fighting a bear or something.

Lance was so distracted by his new infatuation, and the stranger equally as distracted by meeting his gaze as he moved from the door, that neither saw the same beautiful waitress that owned the other half of Lance’s heart pick up a tray from a nearby table and turn, right as the man walked by.

_Now break!_

The collision made the entire diner go quiet as plates and drinks splattered and crashed to the floor, Phil Collins still wailing on above.

_Now love, love don’t come easy. But I keep on waiting, anticipating for that soft voice to talk to me at night. For some tender arms to hold me tight!_

What made Lance jump out of his seat to help, he’d blame on love, stupidity, and the power of Phil Collins’ voice later on.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry!” Allura said, and as Lance came upon the two of them, he could see she was on the verge of tears.

Thankfully, the now soaking wet Earth Angel started laughing instead of yelling, bending down to help her clean up the mess.

“It’s alright,” he smiled, but Allura kept sniffling, which made his expression falter.

He put his hand out to her arm as she was setting a broken mug onto the tray, causing her to gasp and look up at him with sad eyes.

“It’s okay,” he repeated, his voice gentle and sincere. “It was an accident. Don’t worry about it.”

She nodded at him, seeming to accept his kindness to soak up her tears.

_Love don’t come easy, you know it ain’t easy…_

“Hey, are you guys alright?” Lance asked, pushing past his currently breaking heart as he realized that the ones who would get their Love Story Ending today would be the very two he was pining over instead of him.

“Oh, yes, we just had a bit of an accident,” Allura said, smiling despite her wavering voice.

“Well, here, let me help you,” Lance said, bending down to carefully collect a few stray pieces of glass.

“It’s really fine, you don’t have t-”

“I want to,” he smiled, and as his hand brushed against hers, he felt his face heat up.

He darted his eyes away from her embarrassingly and they fell to the leather-jacket-clad stranger, who he only just realized was staring at him with a smile of his own.

“O-Oh boy,” Lance stuttered, totally not prepared to be hit with the deepness of those grey eyes. “Your jacket...”

A tragedy happened when the man’s eyes left Lance, looking down to his egg-covered jacket with a questioning look. Even with food and coffee dripping off of him, the man was beautiful up close and Lance wondered again why he’d never seen him before.

“Well, it’s a good thing this is egg-proof,” the stranger joked, pieces of egg flying off as he adjusted his lapel.

Allura laughed behind her hand and the sound caused a conflicting whirl of emotion to stir up in Lance’s heart when the stranger smiled over at her.

_“You can’t hurry love, no, you just have to wait.” She said “love don’t come easy, it’s a game of give and take…”_

Phil Collins faded out as the last piece of glass was deposited onto the tray and the three stood, Allura carrying the mess in her hands carefully with both men helping her up.

“Thank you both,” she said, setting the tray onto a nearby empty table. “I’m Allura.”

“Shiro,” said the stranger, and then both pairs of eyes fell to Lance.

“Um, Lance. My name is Lance. Nice to meet you both,” he said, trying his best not to check either of them out now that they were all standing so close.

A silence fell on the three of them, none sure what else to say after their shared moment of picking up broken plates.

“Well, I should probably-”

“Allura,” a voice behind the bar called, cutting the girl off before she could finish. It was another waitress, who had apparently just witnessed the whole ordeal. “Why don’t you take a break, girl? I’ll cover your tables.”

“Oh. Thank you, Shay,” Allura responded, looking relieved to have another moment to gather herself.

“I have a booth over there if you guys want to join me?” Lance offered the two of them.

“Sure,” Shiro nodded with a smile.

“I’d love to,” Allura agreed.

He led the others to his table, easily big enough to fit the three of them. Shiro had taken off his jacket as they walked over, and he placed it across the back of the booth before sliding in next to Allura.

Shiro turned his face to look around the joint and unintentionally exposed the muscles of his neck. Allura decided to pull her hair up into a ponytail, unknowingly doing the same as Shiro. And Lance, sitting across from the two of them, tried his best not to stare.

He was failing miserably.

The waitress named Shay brought Shiro a cup of coffee, “on the house,” she said, which only seemed fair considering coffee was spilled on him.

“I’ve never seen either of you around town before today,” Lance said, intending to disguise his hypothetical thirst for literal by sipping on his melted shake, but instead embarrassing himself as his straw let out a loud, empty slurp.

“I just moved here for college,” Allura said, not phased in the least by Lance’s inner plight.

“And after college? Are you going to move back home?” Lance asked, the future he’d already been planning out with this girl he’d just met crumbling at the possibility of “temporary.”

“I’m not sure,” the girl replied smoothly. “I guess it depends on if anything is keeping me here after I graduate.”

Her eyes raked over him as they rose to meet his and Lance swore he saw them flicker with a light instantly recognizable as interest.

Future daydreams restored.

“I’m just here visiting my mother for the weekend,” Shiro cut in, stopping any and all future plans Lance had projected for him before they even started.

“Oh.”

He didn’t even know how to respond to Shiro without sounding like he wanted more from their barely kindled relationship. Which, to be fair, he did.

“But I’m just in the town over and I visit her regularly,” Shiro added quickly, “so I hope to see you both again sometime.”

His eyes passed between the two of them, an eyebrow raised in question as if he’d just asked both of them if they would like to win a million dollars. And Lance was sure going on a date with him – with both of them – would probably feel like the jackpot.

“Oh, that would be wonderful. I think the three of us would get along well,” Allura said excitedly. She smiled at Shiro, then turned to face Lance. “Don’t you agree?”

Lance suddenly felt like the nerdy kid being invited to hang out with the head cheerleader and quarterback: a little out of place and perhaps a bit unworthy. But who was he to turn down the chance at a happy ending where he gets both the girl _and_ the guy?

“I’d like that,” he nodded, returning their smiles in full. “I really would.”

“Then it’s a date,” said Shiro. “Now, I don’t know about you guys, but I am starving.”

“I could eat,” Lance said.

“Me too,” Allura agreed.

Lance watched as Shiro waved Shay back over to take their orders. He laughed at the way Shiro teased Allura for only getting fries. He blushed when Allura offered to share another milkshake with him.

Despite being nearly strangers, everything about their interactions felt completely natural. Like this was what Phil Collins was telling him to wait for. And as ridiculous as it seemed, he was glad he listened. Because watching Allura laugh as Shiro stole one of his fries? That was definitely worth the wait.

**Author's Note:**

> If you like this fic, please leave a comment to let me know! I really appreciate it!


End file.
